


Crash

by agelade, Caladrius



Series: You're the Reason [4]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Bro Feels!, Dean Comes to Visit!, Drunk Dean, Gen, Nightmare, Sensitive Sammy, Stanford Era, Written by Role Play
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-16
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-04 20:55:40
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 11,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1085594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/agelade/pseuds/agelade, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Caladrius/pseuds/Caladrius
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dean shows up on Sam's doorstep one night without warning, drunk and bloody and angry.  Stanford Era, near Christmas.  Standard narrative style (not a phone call fic).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Crash**  
Setting: Stanford Era, December 3rd, Freshman Year  
Dean: Caladrius  
Sam: Agelade

**Chapter One**

_One night around 2 am as Sam is studying, there's a quiet knock at his door. In a few seconds it sounds like someone picking the lock._

Sam looks up from the tiny dining room table where he’s been bent over a book for the last couple of hours, coffee cold in a cup, notebooks annotated in color spread out.  For a moment, he’s tense and he’s judging the time it’ll take the intruder to pick the lock as compared to the distance he’ll have to cross to get to his nearest stashed weapon.

But it can only be Dean — at this hour, _that_ lockpicking stumble, where Dean is good but not as good as Sam.  And of course, he’d knocked.  No burglar or monster would have knocked first —  ( _would they?  Was there a monster that tricked people into thinking they were opening the door for a guest?  No, no probably not._ )  It can only be Dean.

He gets up quietly as he can and pads to the front door in his socks, and just as Dean’s finally — taking a lot longer than Dad would have approved of, Dean — got the lock undone, Sam yanks the door open.

Dean looks up.  Because it is Dean, of course.  But he’s not smirking and he’s not holding a six pack and he’s not looking even remotely apologetic about breaking in.

Not that such an expression was expected.

Dean’s collar is turned up.  There’s blood on it.  There’s smeared blood at the corner of his mouth.  His right eye is partially blackened.  Fresh, but the blood has had some time to cake.

Their eyes meet for a second.  There’s recognition and the feeling of a wide, dark space between them, but Dean won’t linger.

He doesn’t say hi.  He pushes past Sam into the apartment—not a shove, just a heavy brush—and he smells like sweat and blood and alcohol.

"Well hello to you too, Dean.  Come right on in," Sam says, frowning at his brother’s back.  He pushes the door closed with a little click.  Dean smells like a hunt — the scent hits Sam and with it come memories of months ago, a lifetime ago, an instant ago.  Sometimes it feels like he just left, the loss is so terrible and raw; sometimes it feels like decades since he’s seen his family and felt the thrill of a shared hunt, a plan gone right, or the jealousy of his classmates’ normal lives, the way they didn’t have to worry every minute of every day whether their dad was going to come home, whether their brother was going to bleed out this time.

And there’s the alcohol.  Dean had never been a saint, okay, but he’d had to have driven, and he looked —

"Dean, what are you doing here?"

He’s talking to Dean’s back.  To the back of a jacket, over a shirt over another shirt—through layers of _something—_ and his brother stops.

His head turns halfway. A fist closes.

"What does it look like?  I’m crashin’.  Here. On your nice little couch. Problem with that?  Too bad."

Tension was bubbling before, but now it’s laser precise.

Sam tilts his head.  He’s a little hurt even though he can’t put his finger on exactly why.  And he’s torn between _Dean what the hell_ and _Dean, you’re my brother.  Stay as long as you want._  What comes out of his mouth, though, is, “Does _Dad_ know you’re here?”

Dean’s face, the part Sam can see, becomes ugly. His gaze falls on the table, the books, the notes, all painstakingly arranged…

He turns and pulls up the edge of the table, and the whole house of cards slides into a loud, paper-flapping, paper-creasing mess onto the floor.

Dean turns around.

_"Dad doesn’t fucking know."_

It’s loud.  Intense.  Almost a yell.

"Is that it?   _That’s_ what you wanna know?  What _Dad_ fucking thinks?”

Sam starts forward as the table goes over, flash of anger hot in his face, but stops himself short.  All of his work for this twenty page paper due at ten am, scattered.  The cup of coffee crashes into a mess of cold milky brown and cheap blue shards against the floor.  His laptop — a used relic from the student technology office that only worked because he’d been brave enough to take it apart and figure out what the burning smell was — hits on a corner and there goes the $250 Sam had managed to save up.

But these are just things, and Sam has learned from the best to shelve it when something more dangerous is in front of you.  He comes toward Dean with his hand out and his brows together, because the table and his work and his laptop, they’re just things, and Dean is his brother and something is _wrong_.

"Dean, I’m sorry.  That came out wrong.  Talk to me, man.  Did something happen?"

Dean holds up a hand.  He’s not looking at Sam. Pointedly.

"Stop. I don’t wanna talk about it. I’m just gonna bleed on your couch for the night. Send me a bill for the cleaning. Or don’t.”

The couch.  He passed it on his way in.  And now it’s beyond Sam, past this wall of Samantha in the doorway and his eyebrows and whatever.

_And he’s not thinking about it._

He wants whiskey.  He wants to pass out.  He could pass out.

On Sam’s floor.

Boy, _that_ would be beautiful.

He hits the fridge with his fist.  It’s loud. It _hurts_ , but then he opens the damn thing and thank god there’s one beer in here, and he takes it because Sam has to move from the doorway someday.

He takes a swallow and ignores everything until he can’t and chokes.  He looks at the bottle and recognizes it.  

 _I brought this shit five months_ _ago._

Had there been one bottle left that time when Dad called and Dean had just left before dawn?

"What the hell, Sammy.  You live like a slob.” He makes a face.  The memory hurts more than the taste of old beer.

It tastes like _old times_.  And that’s worse.

Sam gapes at Dean downing Sam’s last beer.  He had been _saving_ that beer, dammit.  Okay, he’d been saving it for when Dean came back, a kind of screwed up reminder that Dean had come to visit — but Dean didn’t know that.  Sam frowned and knelt to start picking bits of coffee mug up from the floor.  “I don’t live like a slob, Dean.  The only mess in here is the mess _you_ just made.  Thanks a lot for that, by the way.”

"You’re welcome. But I was talkin’ about a fridge without beer."

Sam’s distracted by a mess. The mess of his coffee-drinking book-studying wreckage on the floor and that’s fine.

That is _fine_.

And Dean slips out of the kitchen and is finished with the beer before he gets to the couch and here’s another place he can leave his mark.  Here’s another thing that’s Sam’s and not Dean’s that he can ruin.

And he makes it a point to slam the bottle on the tiny thing that passes for a “coffee table.” And he makes it a point to throw himself onto the couch because god. He’s tired and he hurts and he has to go unconscious.

But the couch smells like Sam. Just Sam.

Why hadn’t he thought of that first?

He rubs his face onto the arm of it. Sees red come away.  

 _Now_ it’s right.

God. He hates everyone.

"By all means.  Don’t let me keep you from whatever it was you were doin’.”

Sam closes his eyes as Dean weasels past him.  It’s obvious now Sam had just been in Dean’s way, and Sam closes his eyes a moment to regain his composure, squash the anger — he had liked this mug man.  He’d stolen it from the cafeteria and it was _his_.  And this apartment is his.  And the tv is his, and the broken laptop is his and he hadn’t ever had stuff that was really _his_ before leaving for Stanford.

But Dean slams something down in the other room and Sam’s hand slips; he cuts himself on a piece of the broken mug and he gets up to get a towel for it, and when he looks into the little living room, Dean is rubbing the filth from his face onto his couch and—

Sam sighs.  Dean, drunk, bloody.  He runs his finger under the tap to get the red off, dries it briefly with the towel.  The towel goes under the tap for a moment, and Sam takes it and the towel hanging off the oven into the living room.

"Here," he says, holding them both out.  "Or, if you want, the bathroom’s down the hall.  I’ll go get some ice for that eye."

It’s not what Dean wants.

_It’s what I want._

It’s _not_ what he wants.

 _It’s_ the only thing _I want._

But instead Dean says:

"Fuck this," and he grabs the towel and tosses it because he can’t break it.  And he knows he looks like he’s five. But Sam’s not even mad.

He’s not even mad.

And Dean knows he’s being a dick and _I don’t care. Deal._

_Or don’t._

_Or don’t care._

Sam watches the towel sail across the room, one brow up in confusion and a little amusement.  Yeah, sure, the dumpster couch he’d had to clean like seven times before he could consider it clean is smeared with blood now, sure his laptop is a piece of junk now.  The little shithole of a two room apartment he’d tried to make a _home_ reeks of blood and hunting rather than clean laundry and a scavenged scented candle.

But the truth is, that is Dean’s blood on the couch, that is Dean’s anger on his laptop, that is Dean’s scent in his home, and this is Dean throwing a little fit like a child.  He’s going to make Dean buy him a new laptop.  He’s going to make Dean fake a doctor’s note to get an extension on that paper.

But right now, he’s going to find out what the hell is up with Dean before more of the crap he’d made a life out of is trashed, a victim of Dean’s shitty mood.

"Dean," Sam says.  He sits on the couch next to Dean.  "Are you okay?  Are you hurt somewhere?"  He reaches for the collar of Dean’s coat.

_Am I hurt somewhere? Really?_

_I’m hurt_ everywhere.

He lets Sam touch the collar of his coat.  He lets Sam reach the barrier.

Inside the barrier are the memories of earlier that night. Of fights. Of fists. Of leaving.  

_Of Leaving._

He grabs Sam’s wrist, and it’s tight and it’s like he’s holding Sam’s hand again, but he’s not, because he’s pulling it away from him and it’s a warning.  A warning about a barrier and it’s there for a reason.

And Dean is about to say something, growl something about not needing all of this, when his pocket begins to buzz.

And buzz and buzz and buzz.

And it’s Dad and they both know it, but Dean isn’t answering it. The silence between him and his brother and the presence of a phonecall that goes unanswered forms a triangle of _not talking_.  For a _second_ they are all together again.  

But they aren’t.  Not really.  And the buzz goes on and it’s not _right_ but nothing is ever _right_ anymore.

 _Fuck_.

Sam hisses when Dean grabs his wrist, not because it hurts, but because it’s unexpected.  They’ve never had “personal space,” never could afford it, and whatever _Sam_ had wanted — and he’d wanted, space, stuff of his own, a life — he’d never expected Dean to push away like this.  Maybe he deserved it; maybe this is how Dean felt that day in June.

And then the phone, Dean’s phone, and of course it’s Dad.  Dad who doesn’t know Dean’s here.  Does he even know Dean’s driven here drinking?  Does he know about Dean’s blacking eye?  Sam doesn’t know anything about Dad anymore.  He’s a little resentful of the buzz in Dean’s pocket that Dean lets ring.  The last call from Dad _Sam_ has in his call history is from June 6th, before the fight.  It’s December 3rd now.

So Sam pulls his wrist out of Dean’s grip and sits back, away from Dean and stares at the coffee table, mouth pressed to a line, and he says, “You gonna get that or what?”

Dean knows he shouldn’t answer it.

 _I should answer it_ _because…_

Because I’m a good son.  

 _No, because you don’t know what he’ll do if there is_ no one left.

The buzz continues.  When Dean finally looks at the floor, jumps off the couch, grabs the clunky thing out of his pocket, he has to turn away from Sam.  Because Sam shouldn’t know this.  Or maybe he should.  Or maybe Dean still wants to just…

"Dad…"

Dean’s voice is quiet.

"No, sir."

…

"No. I—"

…

"Can’t talk about it now.  I’ll be back."

Dean stares at some uneven, chipped—painted board in Sam’s door frame.  It doesn’t look strong.  Some coke idiot could kick that thing in.

But then…

"Yes.  I swear."

The words.  The words hurt.  He puts his fingers to the bridge of his nose.  He goes through the motions.  He says the words.

"On her grave, yes, sir.  I swear."

And Dean thinks _don’t do anything without me Dad_ at the same time he knows _I shouldn’t have left_ at the same time he wants to disappear because it hurts to be one place always wishing he was someplace else.

Sam fidgets while Dean is on the phone.  He can’t see Dean’s face, but his tone is characteristically subdued, the way Dean has always been with Dad _._ And despite himself, he gets up from the couch and heads for the kitchen when Dean says into the phone _I’ll be back_ , even though of course he’d go back.  Of course he wouldn’t stay.  Sam is always going to lose him to Dad.  That time over the summer when he’d gotten up to make some coffee for them to find Dean was gone —

Sam makes coffee on autopilot while Dean is swearing fealty to their father once again.  And he wonders what Dean is swearing to do, and he wonders why he didn’t tell Dad where he was, and he’s scooping the grounds in and he’s thinking about their mother, a face he only ever saw in a photograph he didn’t even get to keep, because it isn’t his and if anyone deserves it, it’s one of the two people who actually knew her.  And he supposes her face comes to him because Dean is saying _on her grave_ but he doesn’t even remember hearing those words.  Just scoops the grounds, pours the water, stands at the sink, opens the cut on his finger over and over, watches the skin separate to pink and red and then pushes it together again, like nothing had happened.  Pink, and then nothing.  Red, and then nothing.

Red, and then red, and it’s bleeding again.

Dean grabs Sam’s wrist again. Tight again.

"What the hell are ya doin?  Stop that.  It’s creepy."  

He puts one of the towels into Sam’s hand.  Presses it around his finger. He looks at his brother like he slipped a ball bearing, and maybe he has because Sam is real quiet.

But Sam’s stupid and he’s bleeding and what the hell, this part? The stopping the bleeding part?  That’s Dean’s job anyway.

_Was.  Was my job._

Dean puts pressure on Sam’s finger through the towel, then makes him clench a fist around it.

"Hey. You got a hammer around here?  A coupla nails?"

Sam is jolted out of his own head by his brother’s hand around his wrist, hisses when Dean presses the towel around his finger, nods and pulls his hand to his chest when Dean bends his fingers into a fist around the staining terry cloth.  Then he blinks.  He hadn’t even heard Dean come into the room.

"What?  I mean, yeah, somewhere.  Probably.  Why?"

Dean makes a face.

Jesus.  Always with the questions.

_Why?  Why?  Why does Dad leave all the time, Dean?  Why does Dad sometimes come home with blood on his hands, Dean?  What’s Dad thinking, Dean?  Where are we going now, Dean?_

"Just find ‘em."

Dean takes a breath. He walks to the door.  He wiggles that damn board and it’s so _obvious_ Sam, but Sam doesn’t know how to hang a door. Sam knows Latin.  Sam likes debate class and something called _Occidental Civilizations_ and he doesn’t know that this could be fixed. A bit.  Not perfect.

Dean wants work.  It helps to work, to hit something with a hammer at 2am.  It gives him a reason that feels more solid, more permissible, than the other reason.

Sam tosses the bloody towel into the sink and heads to the closet where he thinks he saw a bucket of rusty tools left by a previous tenant, but when he sees Dean is at his front door, rocking a part of the door jamb back and forth, he sighs.  He gives up on the tools, pulls the spare blanket out of the closet instead, drops it on the couch as he passes it.

"Dean," he says.  He puts his hands on either of Dean’s upper arms to stop him from breaking his door, maybe steer him to the couch.  "You can’t start hammering on my door.  It’s two in the morning.  I have neighbors."

"Wow.  That’s interesting.  Because I actually don’t give a shit about your neighbors.  I give a shit about a door to an apartment my idiot brother lives in that can be kicked in by a middle schooler.  Who the hell goes to bed at 2am anyway?"

He should have brought the Impala instead of lifting some easily-accessible PoS in the neighborhood in desperation.  He’d have had tools and none of Sam’s soft soothing voice nonsense holding things up.

He freezes, tenses, as Sam’s hands try to pull him away.

"Just get me the shit I need, Sam."

Dean’s being reasonable.  Completely. His eyebrows, his voice when he says it, they all remind Sam of that.  Gotta secure your shelter—it’s the most basic hunter law.

Unless.

Right. Oh, right. Of course.

Sam’s not a hunter anymore.

Dean’s jaw clenches.  It wears on him.  Fuck, it _wears_ on him still.  It always always will.  He drops his head.  Looks at the door.  It says it, doesn’t it?  This door.  

"Sam, you gotta come back."

It’s a statement of fact.  It, too, is reasonable. _Vital_.

Sam pulls his hands away at the words.  Steps back.  He doesn’t want to have this conversation again.  He doesn’t want to say the words.  He’s pissed that Dean is going to make him say it.

"Dean—"  He stops, breathes, starts again.  "Dean, I can’t.  You know I can’t.  Is this what you’re so worked up about?  Did you think you were gonna come here and convince me to go back with you?  No wonder you didn’t tell Dad where you were going.  He’d have ordered you to stay put."

Dean grits his teeth at that.  He grimaces. His face tilts down but his eyes look up up at Sam.  Dean can still feel the pressure of a fist in his face, on his chin, crusted blood at the corner of his lip.

He grabs his brother’s shoulders and pushes him against the door with force, pins him.

But of course Sam doesn’t _know_ how Dean left.  Doesn’t know.

_Whatever._

"You sorry selfish sonovabitch.  Do you even listen to yourself?  At all? _YOU_ broke it, Sam.   _You_ , okay?  This won’t work. It’s gone to hell because _you_ walked away.”

"I just wanted to go to school, Dean."  Sam doesn’t try to get out of Dean’s grip, because a Dean with the upper hand was basically a captive audience.  "Most kids get to go home for oh, say, Christmas?  Guess what _I’m_ doing in three weeks?  I’m staying here, I’m working in a crappy coffee shop while everyone else sings songs and gets presents.  Because that drill sergeant you’re so loyal to?  Told me to never come back.  I broke it?   _I broke it?_ "  Sam grits his teeth, tears well against his will because Dean always makes it harder, and that’s just when they’re texting.  "What’s your line?  Oh yeah, I’m just following orders."

Dean looks into Sam’s eyes with dismay. Left eye. Right eye.  All hurt and innocence and, really?

Dean feels confusion. It creeps into anger, but really?   _Really?_ Is this kid so _dense?_

 _“_ Sammy, what the _hell_ are you talking about?  ’Most kids get to go home for Christmas’ and you lamenting your…your…” he can’t keep the derision from his voice, “your _coffee shop_ life?  Why do you make it sound like _that_ is the fucking thing that you’re _missing?_ Some perfect life you had and _lost?”_

He pushes Sam harder against the wall.

"You never had that life to _miss_ , Sam.  It’s not us.  It’s not what we _do._ Goddammit.  We’ve got a job and it’s shit sometimes but it’s just us, Sammy.  Just us.  And you fucking left to chase a goddamn mirage like what was _real_ wasn’t in your _face_ twenty-four seven.”

Dean can’t even…he can’t.  Just. Give his little brother up for some fucking…thing that wasn’t…and…be…..

Okay.

Dean lets go of Sam and shakes his head.

_We’re not okay, Sammy!  What the fuck is wrong with you?_

And he fights it the only way he can.

His voice is cold.

"You tell me one thing, little brother, okay?  You tell me how you fucking live with yourself."

Sam closes his eyes to weather the barb.  He wants to react, he wants to curse and cry about it, but he’s not a kid anymore; he’s been on his own for six months.  But it’s two in the morning and he’s been up since 5 am, opening the coffee shop, class, library, evening final, the term paper spread out soaking up coffee on his kitchen floor, and he’s tired, and it’s   _Dean_ —

When he opens his eyes, they’re wet and he sniffs to try to control himself, but he never can face to face with Dean, and this anger?  The cold rolling off of Dean — Sam can argue with Dad until something in the room is broken, but Dean is a different story.

"It doesn’t matter, Dean," he says.  He’s looking down at the coffee table, the scuffed floor, anywhere but at Dean.  "He doesn’t want me.  I’m sorry you had to come all this way.  Stay as long as you want."  And he starts past Dean toward the kitchen.

But Sam can’t get far.  He can’t get more than a step, because Dean’s hand is in the middle of his chest, square.  Resolute. And he’s sidestepped into Sam’s path like a bulldog.

"You can walk away from Dad and justify it, but not me.   _You hear me, Sammy_?”

And now he _is_ yelling.

"I’m saying, you can’t justify it when it’s _me.”_

And Dean hits his own chest when he says it because it starts his heart again.  It starts it going too fast, though.  He’ll punch this kid, and maybe he should, because…

Dean’s jaw works.  His hand is holding Sam to the door.  A door. And goddamn _holding_ him there and there’s way too much too close to the barrier.

"Jesus Christ, Sammy.  What do I have to do to make you see _me?_ ”

 _To make_ anyone _see me!_

Sam looks up.  He tries to steady himself under Dean’s hand, but his heart is thumping and his breathing is ragged with the attempt to hide how he wants to bolt, or throw himself into his big brother’s chest, because it’s hard, okay?  Civilian life is harder than he’d thought it’d be, and that’s so far out of the scope of this conversation, but somewhere in his head his reptile brain wants him to get some comfort now while Dean’s right there in front of him.

But he doesn’t do either, just stands there and looks at Dean and the bruise around his eye and the smear of blood still on his face, what he hadn’t managed to rub off onto Sam’s couch.  Sam puts his hand over Dean’s arm; he’s ready in case Dean picks a fight, and it’s instinct and training at first, but he goes ahead and does it anyway even after realizing that.

"Dean, what are you talking about?  What happened?”

It’s not what Dean wants, this question.

_It’s what I want._

But Dean won’t talk about it.  He’s an asshole, he knows it, but some things aren’t fair to Sam.  Not ever.  Dad’s as much to blame.  But both of them…the fucking _both_ of them…

And Dean’s issue can stand on it’s own.

 _Can’t it?  I deserve that much?  I fucking_ raised you _you ungrateful snot-nosed brat_!

But Sam’s shaking and Dean feels like an asshole because Sam won’t just start a fight but he’ll be frantic and this tone of voice…and Dean forgets he can break Sam so fast, but the feeling is mutual.

So mutual.

Dean takes a breath.  The hurt has settled in.  He drops his head and shakes it.

"Bottom’s dropping out, Sam.  It’s all wrong.  Dad…knows it too. Just come back.  It doesn’t have to be a thing that…that can’t get worked out. You gotta believe me, kid." Dean shakes his head.  "What d’you want me to say, huh?  It’s not working out.  You don’t have to…to fight through the sheeple, Sam."

_I’m begging you._

Sam presses his lips together, frowns in empathy.  It’s not the right time to say he’s wanted to come back a million times before now, even if he thought it’d make Dean feel better.  His hand slides up from Dean’s arm to Dean’s chest and he leans forward.  He gets it, but he doesn’t know how to say that without sounding like there’s a chance he’ll leave with Dean and go back to Dad, because there isn’t.

But he gets it, God he gets it.   _It’s not working out?_ Talk about an understatement.  He had never guessed how difficult it would be just to get to _sleep_ without Dean snoring in a bed next to his, and then there was everything else he’d taken for granted.

"Let’s not talk about me coming back until we’re both… sober.  At least.  But tell me what happened, Dean.  You didn’t just drive out here on a whim, okay?  Come on."

No he didn’t.  Dean had come out here with a purpose, but now, if he’s sober, he’ll know it was a stupid thing to do. Because Sam may get it out of him finally, and Sam shouldn’t know.

Gotta _protect_ Sammy, dammit.

Dean’s tired. He’s full on exhausted, was running on adrenaline and whiskey and pure Winchester stubbornness. He _was_ running on something, and now he’s crawling.  Feels like he’s crawling into Sam’s arms and that’s just…fucking _backwards._

But he _had_ said it was all wrong.

Dean’s expression relays some of the bitterness of the last 24 hours.  He hangs his head and then turns to look away.

"Just don’t…know…what I’m supposed to do anymore, Sammy.  I feel like I don’t…exist."  He hesitates on the word, because Sam’s hand is on him, and his is on Sam and it’s a dumb stupid thing, but.

_I miss this, okay? Being reached for.  Somebody…_

He’s tired.  The barrier is dissolving.  His eyes sting. _Don’t tell Sam. It’s not fair.  It’s a low blow._

Sam’s hand on Dean’s chest turns into a fist, full of Dean’s shirt, full of Sam’s growing sense of frantic worry, because this isn’t a Dean in cool control of himself, this isn’t a Dean who laughs off whatever.  This is a Dean getting kind of philosophical, _I don’t exist_ and _what do I have to do to make you see me?_ This is a Dean who is not okay.

"Dean, you exist," he says, and he pulls on Dean’s shirt.  His other hand comes up and he’s got Dean’s jacket.  "Why wouldn’t you exist?  What am I not seeing?  Because I see you, man.  You’re right here.  Come on, Dean.  Tell me what happened.  Why would you say this stuff?"

"Why?" Dean looks up at Sam, surprised he has to ask. "You know, one job. I had just one job. And then…" he pauses, pulls his hands from Sam, tries to break the connection, but Sam’s not willing to let go and Dean isn’t fighting.

He’s so tired.

"Whatever. You left for bigger and better things, and it wasn’t anything I got a say in…"

So used to having no say, but Sammy…

"…so I picked up your slack and I…" Dean stops mid sentence. He shrugs. He pulls the blurriness from his vision with will power. "It just ain’t enough, Sam. You think Dad wants you to stay gone, but you have to trust me on this…he’ll probably give you a little hell, but he won’t stop you from coming back. "

Dean is resigned.

"Let’s just say, it turns out, I’m not enough. That’s all. Big hole where you were, Sammy, and it’s suckin’ it all to hell."

Sam tilts his head, brows up in some empathy — Dean and Dad alone on the road, man.  He and Dad had always fought, Dean had always been the more or less neutral party.  But with Sam gone, maybe Dean was getting all of the shit when a hunt went wrong?  Maybe — well, whatever happened, maybe Dean’ll tell him tomorrow, or maybe Sam can still get it out of him tonight, but first—

"Come on, Dean," he says, and tugs him toward the couch.  "Don’t be stupid.  You’ve always pulled my weight.  If anything, you’re probably hunting _better_ without me around.”  He can’t help but sound a little bitter, but it’s true, so.

"Dude, are you _purposefully_ not hearing what I’m saying or are you just deaf?  I’m trying to say I’m _not_ hunting better.  Hell, _Dad’s_ not hunting better.  So if that’s your fucking justification, if that’s what helps you sleep at night, well, sorry, man, but here’s the wakeup call.”

Dean’s frustrated. He pushes on Sam, and then he’s suddenly leaning on him and maybe it was 32 hours since he slept for an hour?  And of course _everything_ after that, and Dean yelling and Dad finally taking a swing and…

_Fuck.  I shouldn’t have left._

He’s surprised to find himself on the couch.  He is a leaden pit in its center and he is dragged down by a weight only he can feel.

"So fucking alike…" he mutters, eyes rolling up.  "You should just…either fight me or come back with me…one or the other, Sam.  Do _something_ with me.”

Sam laughs a little, at the ridiculous situation, at Dean’s drunken swing from pushing him away to leaning on him, from shoving him against the door to crashing, literally, onto his couch.  He pulls the blanket out from under Dean and shakes it out.

"I’m not gonna fight you, Dean.  And I’m not coming back."  He sits on the coffee table across from Dean.  "But.  You could always just stay, man.  Just stay here."  He offers the blanket.

Dean thinks Sam’s smiling because Sam’s an idiot.

Why did he come here?  He searches his memory, cloudy now with guilt and fear and drenched with fatigue and alcohol.

 _I had to tell him what he’d_ done.

_I had to make him fix it._

And then somewhere in there he had just wanted to break something, but it wasn’t _Sam_.

And now he’s just a joke, and this is all _hilarious_.

 _I shouldn’t have left_.

Dean ignores the blanket.  He doesn’t belong here.  

He doesn’t actually _belong_ anywhere.   But he swore on Mom’s grave to Dad, so it’d have to keep for tonight.  Because he was going to pass out. Right now.

He slumps over, pulls his legs onto the couch.  

"This ain’t over," he promises sternly, an index finger pointed at Sam’s heart.

And then he’s out cold.

Sam watches as Dean passes out, watches a moment more just to be sure.  Then he spreads the blanket out over his brother, shifts a couch cushion a little under his head.  Brushes over the bruise on Dean’s face, but if he tries to ice it now, Dean might wake up, and Sam doesn’t want him to, Sam doesn’t want to give him any more opportunities to decide to leave.  Not before morning, not before talking this out.

So he relocks the door, puts down a salt line in front of it — he’s got one already, but it’s invisible, salt in the crack between the floorboard and the threshold; Dean’ll feel better if he wakes up and can see he’s safe.  Maybe?  Does he even know what Dean wants anymore?

In the kitchen, he retrieves his laptop and the pages of his research, wipes up the coffee, clears away the rest of the broken mug without cutting himself.  His laptop boots up after a couple of tries, and through the cracked screen, he can see half of the glitching display, enough to get himself through an email to his professor, asking for a week extension because of a family emergency.

In the bathroom, he shakes a couple of tylenol out of a bottle and they, along with a glass of water, go onto the coffee table in Dean’s reach.  He leaves the bathroom light, and at three in the morning, after standing for more minutes than he should have, watching Dean sleep, feeling like shit, he flips off the living room light and heads into his bedroom.

He lays awake, thinking too much.  About Dean, Dad.  How they’ve been doing without him, whether it’s been better without the dead weight of a kid who didn’t want to be there, or whether, like Dean said, he’s left them with some kind of hole.  But all he can remember from being with them is Dad’s hot breath, telling him to work harder, to forget about trying to be normal, to not be so selfish, to never come home — and Dean, standing in the background, face unreadable, , offering no guidance, no clue about what Sam should have done.

And he wonders if he’s remembering it wrong; now with Dean drunk on his couch, he wonders if Dean had been screaming at him not to go the way Sam had been screaming at him to come with him — silently.

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Crash**  
Setting: Stanford Era, December 3rd, Freshman Year  
Dean: Caladrius  
Sam: Agelade

**Chapter Two**

_Orange red yellow_

_Heat._

_Fresh bodies take longer to burn—there’s a lot of water, and the fat under the skin is like wax in a candle: it melts, it’s fuel.  Not like torching a stiff who’s mostly just a dry and brittle unrecognizable collection of bones and dust._

_No. Dean can still recognize this body burning on a pyre in front of him. Burning close enough to scorch him._

_Dad._

_Dean’s been somehow dragged into this scene in total silence, and he can’t move, and he can’t speak—he can only watch as a golden nimbus engulfs his father’s dark hair, his clothes._

_Dean knows how he got here.  He knows full well._

_This man, this impossible man.  This collection of anger, of sorrow. He had a beautiful wife once and two strong boys. And one by one…one by one…_

_One…_

_By…_

_One…_

_John Winchester’s face is black now.  It’s starting to melt.  He’s disappearing and Dean can’t do anything about it because it’s done, but there’s a sound inside the stillness of the yellow and heat and it sounds like a world collapsing in on itself._

_Dean wonders how he’s still standing under it._

_"Well.  This kinda sucks."_

_Dean looks to his right.  Sam lounges next to him, watching the fire.  His thumbs are tucked into his jeans pockets._

_"I mean, we both knew it was probably ending bloody for him eventually, but I figured he still had a few good years left in him."_

_Dean can’t speak.  He literally cannot make his mouth move. He stares at his sensitive little brother in disbelief…_

_Sam takes a deep breath and sighs.  His expression as he watches Dad’s nose and cheeks sink into a sizzling mess is something Dean can’t even fathom.  Because it’s so hollow—indifferent._

_"So, Dean, what’ll you do now?"_

_Sam looks at him._

_Dean tries to even process the question._

_"I mean, you’re free now.  You can do anything you want.  Go where you wanna go.  Gonna keep hunting?  You’ve got other skills, you know."_

_Dean manages to open his mouth.  Grief overwhelms everything, though. If he can get something out of it, it might be sob. He might never stop. He might die of crying._

_Sam looks at his watch in the glow of their father’s burning corpse._

_"Okay, look.  I’ve got class in five, so I gotta go.  You know you’re always welcome at my place, Dean."_

_He claps a hand on his big brother’s shoulder._

_"Give me a call or text me sometime.  Keep me updated."_

_And then Sam turns around._

_He walks away._

_Finally Dean finds his voice.  Finally._

_"Sam!"_

_But Sam’s gone._

_The golden embers of Dad’s funeral pyre give way to the heat.  They shatter. All that’s left is a failing warmth and then darkness…_

****

Dean wakes from darkness to darkness. He gasps it in.  Where the fuck is he?  He sits straight up. His hand tries to find the gun under his pillow, but there’s no gun under his pillow and he hits something and there’s a crash and…and Dad…

"Fuck!"

Dean’s half off the couch but he’s tangled in a blanket and he needs to fucking find his phone because he’s hot and Dad was _burning_ …

_Fuck fuck everything!_

Sam has only been sleeping a minute, or that’s how it feels, when he hears Dean’s voice from the living room.  And his reflexes are still good, so he’s wide awake in an instant and he’s down the hall a moment later and he’s sliding to sit on the couch and reaching to right Dean by the time Dean has fumbled himself halfway to the floor, tangled in the blanket.

"Dean!"

Dean pushes blankets off, he pushes Sam’s hands away.  He doesn’t want to be touched by anything.

Sam who left.  Sam who fucking _left_ and where is his goddamn phone?

_Why the hell did I come here?  I shouldn’t have walked out!_

His hands search frantically, but in his mind, Dad’s already dead.  He’s not going to answer the phone because he’s dead.  He’s not going to give Dean hell when he gets back because he’s _dead. He’s not going to drink or punch or fucking breathe, Dad, BREATHE already! Because he’s DEAD._

Dean’s on his feet.  His phone was in the wrong pocket because he’s an asshole son and he was drunk and he _put his phone in the wrong pocket._

Dean’s eyes hurt. He wipes at them as he puts the receiver to his ear.  His hands are shaking.  His whole body is shaking.  He’s dehydrated but it doesn’t even fucking matter if Dad is already dead…

It rings.

It rings it rings.

"Goddammit.  God fucking…dammit. Fuck…" he’s muttering, but that dream is still so hot.  Dad’s fucking face… _melting_.

And then it picks up.

Dad’s voice.

"Dad."

He feels like he might pass out.  Holy fuck.  Holy god holy fucking shit. Okay.  Okay…fine. Okay.

He makes himself sound calm.

"No.  I’m just…checking in."

"Yes.  Yes, sir.  I won’t.  I’ve got the list of supplies, I’ll bring everything."

He swallows.

_Dad, don’t fucking go anywhere.  I swear to God…_

"Yes.  Get some sleep, Dad."

Dean wipes his face. His hand comes away so wet it’s dripping.

"Bye."

Dean clicks the phone closed. He puts it against his forehead and closes his eyes. He’s relieved but he isn’t because this fucking shit could happen tomorrow…

Sam keeps his hands to himself when Dean pushes him away, and when Dean gets up and is talking to Dad on the phone, Sam stays where he is on the couch, elbows on his knees, staring at nothing.  Why did Dean even come here?  All he can think about is Dad, obviously.

And that’s not fair — he’s had a dream, or a nightmare.  And how often has Sam had a nightmare and scrambled for his phone, gotten as far as finding Dean’s name in his contacts before good sense came back to him?  And he’d have called too, just like Dean, he’d have called them every day for a month back in June, if he hadn’t had Dad’s voice ringing in his head warning him not to.

So, okay, no.  He can’t blame Dean.  And he can’t help it if the worry and desperation radiating off Dean has infected him too; it’s part of why they’re still alive, that Sam can kind of sense when Dean is in trouble or needs back-up, and the reverse is true too.  Or it used to be.  He reaches for the glass of water Dean has spilled.

"Dean?  Everything okay?"  The second it leaves his mouth, he knows it’s a stupid question.

Nothing’s okay.

Dean looks over at his brother sitting there on the couch.  His eyes and his eyebrows so worried and really, Sam?  

_"So, Dean, what’ll you do now?"_

Sam in his dream.  Sam saying Dad’s burning body “kinda sucked.”

Goddammit, Sam.

"No, Sam.  No,   _Nothing_ is okay.  You think…” he stops abruptly, “you think anything, _anything_ since I walked in here has been _okay?”_

Frustration. Fear. Anger. Loss.

"You.  Dad.   _Nobody fucking listens to what I say._ Or you just don’t give a shit.  Or it doesn’t matter because you’ve both _already made up your minds_.  So what does it matter, huh?  Let _me_ be the one to just watch it all blow up, to see all go up in flames.”

_Flames…_

_Sam’s face in that dream. So sympathetic._

_"You know you’re always welcome at my place, Dean."_

_Because Dean was homeless.  Because Dean had no more purpose. Because Dean needed some charity from the little brother who used to…_

"Both of you tie my hands.  You leave me on the sidelines.  You _leave me._ And now, no.  Newsflash.   _Nothing_ is okay.”

Sam shrugs, looks away from Dean.  “I know,” he says.  He closes his eyes.  This doesn’t feel fair — when he sees the other kids here at school call their folks and share their worries and get reassurance about the parts of leaving home that are terrifying, he shoulders it because it was his choice, but just now, with Dean calling him out for it, it doesn’t seem fair.  He looks back at Dean and gets to his feet.  Dean has to understand this, he has to.  “I know nothing’s okay, but I didn’t leave you, Dean.  I wanted you to come with me.  And I’m _trying_ to listen to you Dean, but you won’t _tell_ me anything.  You won’t _talk_ to me, Dean!  Just talk to me!”

"Fine.  Okay, fine."

Why, exactly, was he protecting Sam again?  Oh, right, because it was his _one job_.  But it was over.  Sam was on his own, buying stuff for himself, working at a legit job, with a steady place and a couch and shit like tables and chairs and a key to one lock that he didn’t have to turn in the next day.  And he didn’t live out of a bag or a car.

Dean shudders.  Shakes it off.  Fuck it, then.  Tell him and let him deal with it.

"Fine.  I already told you nothing’s been right since you left.  You know how Dad gets on November 2.  You know…"

_Dad staring at a picture of Mom. Dad crawling into a bottle.  Dad…gotta tip toe the fuck around him because it’s just bad.  It’s just a bad bad bad day.  The day Mom died.  The day everything burned down.  But then he’d eventually come out of it.  Eventually…_

"…This year…he hasn’t come out of it.  He hasn’t come out of it, Sam, and he’s doing…reckless shit.  Reckless even for Dad."

Dean shakes. Puts a hand to his forehead.  

"…Almost lost him twice in a week.  And I can’t take it anymore because it’s not _me_ he’s missing.”

Sam’s defensive, anger-lined face relaxes into sympathy and he steps toward Dean.  “Jesus,” he breathes.  Because it’s _December_.  Dad’s been like this for a _month_.  Sam reaches out, and he’s careful, but he lays a hand on Dean’s arm as he circles him, stops in front of Dean and his hands are on Dean’s arms.  Sam hasn’t seen Dad’s drinking as anything but what it really is in recent years, destructive and dysfunctional, but Dean idolizes Dad and his drinking, Dean considers an allowable coping mechanism.  Considering what they’ve all had to cope with, maybe they’re both right.  But a month in the bottle, a month as a reckless ghost who might as well have no family depending on him — to Dean that’s like betrayal.  God.  Dean, God.

"Dean," Sam says.  "He’s missing Mom, man.  Maybe with me out of the way and you such a great hunter, he doesn’t feel like he has to rein it in like he used to.  That’s what it is, Dean.  He’s grieving, but he _cares_ about you.  Look.  He called in to check on you, he answers you when you call him in the middle of the night?  Right?”

Dean is stunned.  He’s mystified. Every line of his sleep-deprived, bruised, once-bloody face expresses it.

"You think I came here because this is about _me?_  This is about _you_ , Sam.  You and Dad and this thing and it’s not working out. Okay?  Are you _trying_ to say Dad doesn’t care you left?  Is that it?  Is that helping? Goddammit, Sam.  My job was to take care of you.  Who in the hell do you think was on my case about it 24/7?  Who do you think I answered to when you swallowed a fucking paperclip when you were two? _Dad needs you_.  We both do.  Can the sympathy crap.  I don’t want it.  You wanna do something for me?  Really?  Then work it out with Dad because I swear to God I can’t _reach_ him, Sam.”

_I’m going to lose you both!_

He points at the door.

"Twenty-four hours ago I did CPR on that man.  I fucking gave mouth to mouth to _Dad_ , Sam.  Two breaths and five compressions made this a different kind of housecall.  You _come back and fix it_ because he doesn’t care what I say!”

Sam lets go of Dean, steps back.  For a moment, there’s nothing but the feeling of the coffee table against the back of his calves, or there’s _everything_ battling for importance in his head.  Dad… almost died.  Dean saved him.  Who’s surprised?  No one, no one.  But how is Sam supposed to fix that?  He is staring at Dean and when he rubs at a tickle on his cheek he finds it wet.  His heart is in a vice.

Sam shakes his head minutely.  “He doesn— What makes you think he cares what _I_ say?  He told you to watch out for me man so he wouldn’t _have to_.  He didn’t want to do it himself, Dean.  And I’m _sorry_ for that.  But it’s not me he wants to hear from okay?  I tried.  I tried.”  He tries to step backward again, out of Dean’s space, but there’s the coffee table and Dean in front of him, and he looks for an escape.

"You tried?"  Dean asks.  "What do you mean you tried?  How?"

He hadn’t considered that Sam would have broken the silence himself, not after _that_ fight.  Not with the two of them as stubborn and hard-headed as they were.  Not after the things, _terrible things,_ Dad had said to Sam that were _not true_ , okay?  Just full of anger, and because Sam wanted to leave.  The fact that he _wanted_ to leave had just sent Dad over the top.  The truth was that it had been building for years, this blowout, and Dean had watched the rickety scaffolding of his life creak and falter and crash in an argument that was so thoroughly beyond his control.

And he lost his little brother.  He lost this whole huge part of his rationale for being alive and he was supposed to just live with that.  Both of them wanted him to just _live_ with it.

"How, Sam?  How did you try?"

Because Dad never said anything about _that_.  Not that he would have. Not that he ever talked about Sam.  He pointedly didn’t talk about Sam. Dean wasn’t allowed to talk about his little brother.  He wasn’t allowed to unless he wanted a fight that might or might not involve some form of physical altercation.

And it was getting worse.  But was it getting worse because Dad missed Sam, or was it getting worse because _Dean_ missed him?

"Tell me how.  What happened," he commanded, and he wanted to know the truth.

"Dean," Sam says, and he almost backs himself right over the coffee table, and if it weren’t for Dean’s hand clamping down on his arm, he’d have ended up on his ass and possibly escaped this, but Dean’s grip is firm.  "He didn’t tell you.  I’m not surprised."  Sam bites his lip.  Dean didn’t need this shit and he would probably just say Sam didn’t try hard enough, but—

"I called him. After a week of being pissed and stubborn and alone and — I broke down and I called him.  I thought you know, he’d have cooled off, that he hadn’t really meant it.  But he.  He just said the next time he’d be in touch would be to tell me you were dead."  But it’s like four am and just the thought of Dean dead is enough to push him over the edge and he pulls out of Dean’s grip enough to swipe across his face.

Dean stands up straight.  Those words sink in and he’s not even imagining that Sammy would lie about that.  Nor did he have to—their father had become impossible for weeks after the fight.

Impossible for John Winchester was a life of hellish silence for Dean. Not a whisper or a mention about Sam.  Not a hint or a remark, not even in passing, not even in anger.  Like Sam had never even _existed_. But, by the same token, the man had become more of a machine than ever before.

It was like Sam leaving had taken whatever soul John had had left with him.

But this?  Saying that he’d call when Dean was _dead_?

Dad was a real piece of work.  Best hunter in the world, yes, because he knew exactly how best to kill every damn thing in existence with a weapon or a word.

His fucking temper? Legendary.  Even Bobby had wanted to shoot the man once.

"Sam, that was a week after the fight.  A week," Dean’s trying to calm down.  Trying to be reasonable.  "This is Dad. He doesn’t cool down, he goes sub zero.  You _know_ that.  You set up the Stanford stuff completely behind his back.  You disappeared and scared the shit out of us for your interview.  For Chrissakes that fight was in _June_.  Gotta be room to try again.”

Sam watches him a moment.  Yeah, of course he knew Dean wouldn’t have thought he tried hard enough.  And that’s fine.  Who _wouldn’t_ want their family back together?  But it hurts that Dean just immediately comes up with excuses for Dad.

"I scared the shit out of him?  Oh, that explains why he answered the phone with oh my God Sammy, thank God you’re okay.  Oh, no.  Wait.  He didn’t.  And in what _universe_ is it acceptable that the _teenager_ comes to his senses first?  That’s bullshit, and you know it.”

"Whatever, Sam!" Dean waves his arm. "Everything is so awful because our family isn’t like families where everyone feels safe and happy and just worries about little Tommy backing the car into the mailbox—like families that don’t invest in silver bullets and rock salt and then get their hearts ripped out by werewolves and tossed down stairs by ghosts.  Stop comparing us to _them._ We don’t _have_ anyone else but Dad, Sam.  I’m not sayin’ Dad can’t be a stubborn bastard—he is, but that’s why he’s alive, okay?  Seriously.  I’m not arguin’, man, I’m just _beggin’_ you to come back with me.  See how it is. If I’m wrong, I’m wrong.”

"You’re wrong," Sam says.  "I already know how it is.  You think I just called once?  You remember in late September, I called you out of the blue?  Just to chat.  Yeah.  I wasn’t calling just to chat, Dean.  I called to make sure Dad was alive, because he wouldn’t answer my calls.  Still think I didn’t try hard enough?  That was _months_ later, and I _needed_ him, and he didn’t even pick up the phone.”  Sam backs away, sidesteps around the coffee table, and he’s shaking his head and trying to get himself under control.  “I only tried one more time, man,” he says, subdued.  “A month ago.  November 2nd.  And he didn’t pick up.  So you’re right.  This is all my fault, Dean.  And I’m sorry.  And I’ll never call again.  I didn’t mean for this to happen.”  Sam closes his eyes, composure slipping.  Dean’ll probably leave now.  “Dean, I’m _sorry_.”

Dean stares at Sam.  Stares as he tries to process this.  Tries to figure this into the framework of all the fucked up desperation of the last month.

But the last hunt…the last hunt Dad was definitely so off his game, and he refused to go to a hospital even though he had just fucking _died_ in Dean’s arms.  And five hours later, after a few shots when Dean finally got up the nerve to beg him to call Sam, that was when the fist had laid him out on the motel floor.

And that’s when he had left on his fool’s errand.

Dean squeezes his eyes shut. He puts a hand to his mouth and looks away.

"Jesus, Dad…" he says softly.

And this is bad, because one look back at Sam and Dean just _knows_ what he’s thinking: his _calls_ are the cause of Dad’s fucked up state and _not_ the lack of them.

_Goddammit._

"Sam…" He starts, but what is he going to say _now?_  Dammit.  

And Sam’s face is just…sadness and guilt…and that’s what Dean had _wanted_ a few hours ago.  And for hours before that.  And for weeks before _that_.  But not because of this.  Not for _this_.

_Dammit, Dad!_

"Sam, listen."  But Sam has listened enough, and he’s visibly and mentally drawing away from hearing anymore.  And so Dean has to move around the stupid coffee ta—

Dean grimaces and kicks the damn thing out of his way because Sam’s fast and any second he’s going to bolt, externally or inwardly, and Dean’s not letting him get away _this_ time.

"Dad doesn’t _hate_ you.  I swear to God, I don’t know what goes on in his head, but he doesn’t, okay?  You gotta believe me on that much.” Dean puts a hand on Sam’s shoulder, grips him hard.  ”He figured out that I was here.  You know, when I showed up on that hunt? ‘broke in?’  I figured out that he found out about weeks later, but he never said anything about it.  Hey, are you listening to me?  He never said one thing to me.”

He can’t meet Dean’s eye, but Sam is listening, of course he’s listening, but all he hears is Dean making excuses, Dean telling him _Dad_ left the presents, Dad visited but Sam was asleep, Dad can’t be expected to blahblahblah, Dad is the best but that means he can’t blahblahblah — So Dad never said anything to Dean even though he knew Dean was in California?  So what.

And of course he didn’t say anything to Dean about visiting Sam.  That would mean he’d have to acknowledge Sam existed.  And as much as Dean loves Sam?  Dad would have been shooting himself in the foot, turning his loyal son against him.

And thank God he hadn’t done that.  Or who would have saved him after Sam had practically killed him?

Sam just needs to think.  He just needs a moment.  Because a phone call he made resulted in Dean having to revive their father after a reckless hunt, and it isn’t rolling off his back.  He backs up a step, he tries to twist out of Dean’s grip.

"Sam?"

It’s a warning tone.  This is a Sam Shutting Down face, and Dean’s in no mood to do this.

Sam’s senior year of high school the kid shot up literally a foot.  It was amazing.  Freshman year: total squirt - skinny, scrawny, though much more wiry than any would-be bully would know…until it was too late.  By the time he was 18, people moved out of his way and then turned around to watch him go.

Yeah. Well.

Muscle memory—Dean taught this kid his moves.  Not that Sam was a pushover (Dean was proud of that fact), but little brother was probably out of practice.  He’d sit on him if he had to, in his own house even, because Sam had run away in the past but never because of something Dean had said or done.

This would be the first time…

Honestly, Dean isn’t sure his heart can take it.

"Sam, don’t do this…"

And Dean is stalling for time, because this wasn’t how this was so supposed to _end, goddammit._ And now that he’s starting to sober up for real, Dean realizes the truth:

All his earlier protests to himself that he shouldn’t have come were wrong—He _should_ have come, but not like _this_.

Sam pulls away again, looks around the room a little, not at Dean never at Dean — “I just have to… take a walk.  I need some air—”  He’s looking for his flip flops, Dad would have hated them which is why he even has them.  And everyone wears them here on the west coast because no one has to think about sturdy protective footwear.  “Practical” here means quick and light, not steel-toed and good for running.  It’s different here, it’s different here, he’s different here, or is he?  He’s still a killing machine, even when all he wants to do is talk to his Dad on the anniversary of a terrible day.  Oh, there’s those flipflops, half under the little table that holds his TV.  He starts for them.

Dean thought he’d have to fight Sam, that Sam was going to fight him. He prepared for it, braced for it…

But Sam isn’t arguing or pushing back.  He looked like he was crumbling, and yeah, Sam hid when he was upset.  Not really, not physically, not most of the time, but he could hide in plain sight.  In his head.  And that always triggered a borderline panic response in Dean that he couldn’t stop because…

…Because of that one time when Sam went away in his head and was gone for two weeks when he was ten…

So Dean swallows. He doesn’t stop Sam from getting his flipflops, Sam? Really? But at least he wouldn’t be sprinting faster than Dean in _those_. Maybe. Possibly.  

"Okay, yeah.  Let’s get some air.  Maybe even go for a drive if you want."

 _Stay with me, Sammy.  Just…just stay with_ me.

"Hey, I even promise I won’t, like…kidnap you or anything."

He could promise that, right?  Maybe.  Maybe not.  It depended on Sam, really.

He wasn’t letting Sam out of his sight. Not now.  Dean had given up officially on trying to spin anything with Dad. It would be hollow and useless because Sam wasn’t an idiot—he’d put a reasonable two and two together even if it was _wrong_.  No.  Dean was completely focused on just keeping the kid from walking out on him.

Sam shakes his head and slips into his shoes.  It’s December, even in California, so he pulls his hoodie off the one dining room chair he owns and shrugs it on as Dean talks; he feels numb and he needs to go.

"Go back to sleep, Dean."  He crosses the room with a couple of long strides and pushes past Dean.  "Just stay here."

Yeah right.  Fat chance on that.

"Yeah, you’re not tellin’ me what to do," Dean growls. "You go, I go."

Dean’s been doing nothing for months but chasing after Sam, chasing after Dad, when one time they used to be so close they practically lived in each other’s pockets. Dean and Sam shared clothes. They shared cans of soda, beer.  They shared beds when there was no room.  And floors, and the back seat of the Impala, sprawled over each other because Sam turned out to be 900 feet long and had about 20 arms and legs. And he was a freaking furnace, and fogged all the windows to the point where sometimes Dean couldn’t breathe.

And there wasn’t a damn day that went by that Dean had minded it. Never thought about how much he had needed it until one night it was cold in in the back seat…

And Dean would hang back here, would give Sam time to process, but to let him out of his sight now would be to lose it again.  

Maybe it wasn’t Dad.  Maybe it wasn’t.  Maybe Dean had said one too many things. Looked at an empty seat one too many times.  Maybe Dean was partly responsible…

 _Don’t fucking think about useless shit right now.  Follow Sam._  

Sam looks at him then, anger swells.  “You go, I go?  Since when?  I asked you Dean I— I wanted you to come with me.  So what’s _changed_?  You have to keep an eye on me now?  Make sure I don’t accidentally kill Dad from states away?  Just leave me alone—”  And he pushes past and through and he’s slamming the door open.

"Just leave you alone, huh? Pretty sure I didn’t drive eight hours banged up and drunk to _leave you alone,_ so, no thanks.”

 _Not even going start with that, Sammy.  Not even gonna start with this who gives who guilt trip thing about leaving, okay?  Because exactly what in the name of God was there for me in a fucking college town except get tossed out of bars and go fucking_ insane _?  Super spectacular that you got a scholarship.  You had options._

_Mom’s still dead.  Dad’s still looking for her killer.  Get a clue!  We need you!_

"I’ll be back, Dean, it’s _my_ apartment.  I just need to get some air—” And he’s out, and despite his feelings on the matter — always in spite of him or regardless of him — Dean is on his heels.  Sam doesn’t let Dean keep up with him, long strides are great for keeping your brother in the rear-view. Out through the front door of the building and down the sidewalk in the middle of the night — early morning now, sidewalks Sam knows well and Dean doesn’t know at all, but he’s still not letting Sam lose him.  Sam marches on, hands shoved into the pockets of his hoodie.

"I didn’t ask you to drive all this way, and you’re an idiot for doing it drunk.  But you don’t need me to tell you that, Dean.  So why are you really here?  You know the truth now, about me and Dad."

"Oh, I’m sorry, are we having a conversation now?  I don’t do that from the back of the bus." Dean’s tone is short, but he’s relieved he’s not been shut out.  He’s not being ignored.

Check one in the “I can work with this” column.

Sam’s so goddamn _long_ but Dean’s in plenty good shape (except for the bruised face.  The bruised ribs from three weeks ago.  A pain in his ankle from some other time he can’t even remember right now.) and he eventually catches up to Sam.

"Yeah, I know the truth." _The two of you are too much alike, goddammit._ But Dean won’t say that because Sam will lose his shit entirely.  Dean sighs.  He watches the sidewalk. The street. The side roads. The three loud guys coming out of a place a block away.  The really dark spot in an alley with a broken streetlight.

"The truth is that Dad’s being an ass.  Why does that mean I gotta leave?"

"No the _truth_ is that — okay, yeah.  That is the truth.  But it’s also obvious you came here to get me to come back without knowing I already tried to reach out to him, okay, and it got him nearly killed, and you don’t have to leave, Dean, God.”  Sam stops without looking up at Dean.  He’s staring at the sidewalk, he’s thinking about Dad lying somewhere on the cold winter ground, Dean frantic and competent, but he must have been so frightened to have come out to California.  He must have been so desperate, blowing breath into Dad, chest compressions, waiting _waiting_ for him to cough and glare and shout so that Dean would know he was okay.  Dean had to have been terrified.  Sam had done that to him, to Dean, that was his fault, okay?  But it had happened just days ago, and Dad had called him, and he said he’d be back, and —

"You don’t have to leave, Dean," Sam says again, slowly.  "I don’t — I don’t want you to.  But.  Why _are_ you here?  I mean, sure, you think whatever about me — but why now?  Dad is hurt and you… Dean.  Did something happen?”

Dean stops one pace in front of Sam. He turns to the side and considers the mostly empty road before he looks back at his brother, all shaggy, messy bangs. A face half moon-pale from a street light, the other completely dark.

"You already said, it, Sam.  I came to get you.  But wait, wait." He makes a face as his brain backs up.  "What do you mean, I think ‘whatever’ about you?"

Sam shakes his head, looks off.  “You think I can fix something.  I can’t fix anything, Dean.  I can only make it worse.  Obviously.  And you know that now, so if you need to go back to Dad — then maybe—”  He can’t finish that, not without his voice shaking, because the last thing he wants is for Dean to go, but his reason for coming here is gone, and he’s promised Dad he’d be back soon, and Sam still can’t look at him because of the position he’s put him into.

Well, Sam has _one_ point. _God, Dad, let a guy take care of you_ , but Dad didn’t listen to Dean’s concerns, and Dad let himself almost die, and Dad misses Mom and Sam, no matter what Sam says, but Dean’s a trusty fixture like a shotgun.  He was built and he works and he’s good in a fight, but at the end of the day, Dad has other weapons…

And Dean so wanted to think Dad needed him, especially after Sam left, but he doesn’t.  He doesn’t want help unless it’s on his terms.  He doesn’t have any use for a gun that won’t fire right. And a gun has no better chance of warning its owner, of trying to get through his stubbornness, as Dean has had trying to get Dad to rethink a few things. To not fucking _die_.

And he has to go back.  He does.  He has to go back because it’s Dad and this is all Dean knows and Dad’s said so many times how Mom is counting on them…

But Sam’s voice is a certain tone right now.  And Dean wasn’t sure he’d ever hear it again.  He’s a bad brother.  He’s terrible.  He should be happy for Sam moving out and moving on if he’s good at something else, but he can’t be happy.

Because the Impala is cold without him…

But Sam _does_ miss him.

Dean smiles.  He doesn’t think Sam can see it.  And if Sam moves his head Dean’s face goes slack.

_Goddammit, I’m an asshole._

Dean takes a deep breath.

"Whatever.  I’m here now.  I’m fixing your door as soon as it’s ‘acceptable.’  Is there a place that serves something around here? I could go for about 10 eggs. And bacon. And coffee." He rubs his hands together and lets the prospect of breakfast explain his grin.

He slaps Sam in the stomach lightly.

"I’ll buy."

Sam does look up then, all wrinkled eyebrows and damp but drying eyes.  Dean’s putting on a show, okay.  Sam knows that.  They aren’t done talking.  But for now, everything’s okay.  Everything’s okay for now.  Because Dean always fixes it, even when Sam doesn’t want him to.  Sam breaks it, Dean fixes it.  Army guys, action figures, bent baseball cards, his shoe that one time — Dean just fixes it.

And Sam watches that smile as Dean anticipates protein on a plate, and his smile is infectious, and Sam can’t help but laugh a little.

"Damn right you’re buying," he says.  "I’m suddenly broke, due to having to buy a new laptop."  He smacks Dean in the arm and nods ahead of them.  "There’s a 24-hour diner in walking distance.  Greasiest food on the west coast.  You’ll love it."

“ _Yeah,_ I will…”

And now the prospect of food _does_ make Dean grin.  

He’s not going to apologize about the laptop—It was a thing.  He’s already apologized in his own way for being a dick to his brother.  Maybe not enough, but enough for now.  Sam’s smile says he accepts it, and that’s going to get Dean through until dawn.  Until other things have to be said or done and Dean has to drive away.

And Dean’s not dumb.  There’s only one reason why salad-eating Sam would know this place serves the greasiest food on the west coast…

"Let me guess.  You’ve been waiting for five months to prove it."

Dean finally puts his hands in his pockets.  Every other step, his elbow bumps into Sam’s.  

He missed that too.

He misses this kid…

_I’ll convince you to come back one of these days, Sam._

[FIN]

 


End file.
